Sunday, 30 October 2011

Constitutional law expert Prof Aziz Bari today gave his statement to the police over a death threat and bullet mailed to him yesterday following a recent controversy involving his remarks over the Sultan of Selangor.

The controversial International Islamic University (UIA) professor told The Malaysian Insider he received an envelope containing a bullet and a note saying “Jangan kurang ajar dengan Sultan, maut nanti (don’t be rude with the Sultan, you may die later)” at his Bandar Baru Selayang home around 11.45am yesterday.

Mdm Chen, 42, has a master's degree in economics and had married the son of a rich man at the age of 20.

Her father-in-law was the boss of a listed company in Malaysia, but instead of helping with the family business, her husband indulged in gambling and incurred debts of more than $1 million.

Mdm Chen said, "I was a stock appraiser in Malaysia at the time earning RM$50,000 (about S$20,000) a month. But it was not enough to pay my husband's debts. His family disapproved of his behaviour and refused to help him."

Zoya Amirin believes that empowering women in patriarchal Indonesia may start from the bedroom.

Dubbed as the country's first certified female sex therapist, Zoya highlights the importance of women showing initiative in their sex lives as initial step to their own empowerment.

"They [women] must feel comfortable with their own sexuality, so that they can take charge. We are not talking about them being feminists but how they can be happy in their womanhood," the 36-year old said in an interview with The Jakarta Post recently.

A lecturer at the University of Indonesia, Zoya also knows that this is easier said than done.

SINGAPORE - The teenager who sued well-known plastic surgeon Martin Huang over nude photographs taken before a scar-removal operation has now taken issue with his post-settlement remarks to the media.

The 17-year-old girl settled her lawsuit for personal trauma and distress she suffered as a result of the photographs by Dr Huang on Tuesday . After the settlement, Dr Huang told a local media outlet that he was "not apologising for wrongdoing but for the distress of her experience."

He said the photos were "not wrongly taken" and that the case had been settled amicably "without any admission of liability."

Saturday, 29 October 2011

PETALING JAYA: Local Ahmaddiyya Muslims are tired of being discriminated against, and want to challenge the state to a discussion on their stand as believers.

The Selangor Islamic Religious Department (JAIS), according to Ahmadiyya spokesman Maulana Ainul Yaqeen Sahib, has worked hard to declare his community as apostates.

“JAIS has been attacking the Ahmadiyya through the media. Everything gets thrown against us. It’s not fair. They say we are not Muslims, and (at the same time) they don’t give us a chance to say anything (in return),” he told FMT.

Perkasa, the ultra right wing movement, desecrated Deepavali day by spewing more than its usual venom at its second annual general assembly. Obviously, Perkasa activists had no Hindu friends to visit on that auspicious day.

It is a wonder that these toxic Perkasa people are not locked up on national security grounds and the keys thrown away for good. That is the only way to prevent them from infecting all good people in the country with their poisonous brew of half-baked theories, lies, politicised history, pseudo-science and racism.

Birds of a feather flocked together as Perkasa chief Ibrahim Ali was joined by former IGP Abdul Rahim Noor and an assortment of various unsavoury characters with dubious pasts. These included Shazryl Eskay Abdullah, a masseur associated with the production of a pornographic tape, Kulim-Bandar Bharu MP Zulkifli Noordin, who got the boot from PKR for making racist outbursts too frequently, and former information minister Zainuddin Maidin, an Indian Muslim who was sacked as Utusan Malaysia editor.

Lawyers for Liberty once again calls upon Prime Minister Najib Razak not to dilute the protection that international law accords to refugees.

With the purported agenda of busting people smuggling and combating human trafficking, the Malaysian Government, has reiterated its determination to revive the scandalous refugee swap deal despite the Australian High Court's finding which declared the deal illegal.

Given the findings of the Australian High Court which found that the Minister in charge was unable to satisfy the Court that Malaysia had met three important criteria that would deem it safe for asylum seekers, the Malaysian Prime Minister's insistence that refugees are treated very well rings hollow.The safe third country criteria are that the country must

If for whatever reason Malaysian-born Hollywood star Michelle Yeoh were to dump the international fast lane for the local political scene, she will be joining BN and the MCA in particular.

"Anyone can join politics if he or she has the commitment to serve the public. But Michelle Yeoh will join MCA if she takes up politics. She is a die-hard BN supporter because her father Yeok Kian Geik was the MCA Perak chairman before. She even posed as the BN's model during the last election urging people to vote BN. I would doubt her credentials as she has never been impartial all this while," Taiping MP Nga Kor Ming toldMalaysia Chronicle.

In this photo released by Australian Department of Defence, the stern section of an uncharted submarine wreck is shown on the seabed off the coast of Rabaul, Papua New Guinea

As Rabaul was Japan's major base in the Southwest Pacific for most of the war, most of the submarines in the harbour had been Japanese.

"My best guess would be it's a Japanese midget submarine. It doesn't look big enough to be an ocean-going ... submarine," said former submariner Gary Oakley.

One- and two-man Japanese midget submarines were transported by ship or larger submarines and used covertly to infiltrate enemy targets including Pearl Harbor in Hawaii and Sydney Harbor.

Such a submarine could have been destroyed by an American air raid or naval bombardment or even scuttled by the Japanese toward the end of the war, said Oakley, also an Australian War Memorial curator.

He said it could also be the first Australian submarine lost in World War I, although that submarine, AE1, was thought to have sunk in another harbour some 20km away.

AE1 became the first Australian naval loss of the war when it sank on Sept. 15, 1914, with the loss of 35 lives.

Friday, 28 October 2011

Former prime minister Mahathir Mohamad, known for his decades of inhumane administration, has come out strongly against Human Rights in Malaysia. This was after Rahim Noor, the thuggish former policeman who beat up Anwar Ibrahim while he was handcuffed, equated the Human Rights movement with Communism.

Mahathir declared that he was against Human Rights because it would allow people of the same sex to marry. Clearly he is mixing it up with gay rights. But then, Mahathir always seems to have homosexuality on his mind, right from his graphic description of a homosexual act on national television in 1998. He also built the twin towers, an entirely unnecessary piece of real estate for a small nation like Malaysia, and a phallic symbol if there ever was one. It remains an unviable and loss-making entity, propped up by Petronas and clever accounting.

One fact is clear, there will be no room for reconciliation in Malaysia. In the event Pakatan Rakyat takes power in this election, the people will demand justice for the crimes that have been committed against them. At which point Pakatan had best not suggest forgiveness or reconciliation for the worst of the BN politicians or their cronies. Or for any of them.

Opposition Leader Anwar Ibrahim has said that he has forgiven the crimes committed against his person and against his long-suffering family. That is his prerogative.

The writing is on the wall for Perkasa, founded two years ago by political chameleon Ibrahim Ali. Chances are it won't last another two years.

An object of ridicule to the non-Malays and unable to influence his own community, Malaysia's most famous rabble-rouser is looking at fast-shrinking membership in the ultra Malay rights movement that took shape after a series of church torchings in 2010. And whether he officially closes shop or not, Perkasa looks doomed to irrelevance, hit by Ibrahim's own lack of ideas, dynamism and vision for his cause.